Breaking free (GxG)

Chapter 27 - Knock knock

What the hell was this place now? And where was Taylor?

I looked around me but everything was white except for this little house in front of me. No street, no car, no people around. Just this house. It looked very lovely but unknown to me. I still walked towards the entrance door and it opened just like magic to let me enter.

When I stepped in, I was immediately welcomed by warmth and a pleasant smell of cooking. The decoration was a bit ancient but very charming and the size of the house was standard. I walked further in and peeked in the first room on the left, where I encountered the kitchen.

And unexpectedly, a man.

“Hum… Hello?”, I called confusedly.

The man spun around, making me even more lost as to what I was doing here. He looked pretty old, he was small and dressed like a basic seventy year old, but something radiating was coming off him.

“Hi, Brooklyn! Dinner’s almost ready”, he said enthusiastically and approached me before wrapping his arms around my shoulders to give me a quick hug that I didn’t reciprocate. “You can make yourself comfortable in the living room if you want. I shouldn’t be long”, he said kindly and turned back to his cooking so I immediately left the kitchen.

Maybe seeing the living room would give me some indication to identify this place. I walked at a fast pace and reached the end of the hallway where I could finally see that living room. Same decoration. The kind of furnitures you could only see in old people’s houses but that always brought so much comfort and tranquility. There was a sitting area with a little TV on one side of the room, the table on the other side and on one wall was the fireplace. A huge sideboard was standing opposite to the fireplace so I approached it to see if there were any pictures. Bingo.

Wait. I knew that face from somewhere.

I extended my arm to grab the little frame and brought it closer to be able to scrutinize it attentively. It was a picture of this man with whom I presumed to be his wife. They were both smiling brightly and hugging each other as they posed all happily. The more I focused on that woman, the more I was convinced that I knew her. I looked at her outfit, her hair and then her face before fixing upon her big smile.

Big smile… Smiling girl! Oh my god, that was the florist.

“Gary!”, I called loudly and ran towards the kitchen to go talk to him. “Gary, I know your wife!”, I exclaimed excitedly as I entered the room and he immediately spun around with a content expression on his wrinkled face.

“You do?”, he asked surprisingly.

“Yeah, I bought flowers from her for my girlfriend. Well, she gave them to me but I still left money so I technically bought them”, I explained enthusiastically.

“You have a girlfriend?”, he asked softly as he smiled brightly.

“Yes, her name's Taylor”, I answered proudly and couldn’t help but grin like a goof once again. The sound of her name itself was making me happy.

“Very lovely. Even if she carries a boys name I’d like to hear more about her. Give me a hand with the plates so we can get more comfortable at the table.”

Gary and I brought all the food and drinks to the table and we took a sit in front of each other. I was impatient to try his meal. It smelled very good and I was starving. I politely offered to serve so I placed some rice on one side, the vegetables on top of it and finished with the meat before placing his plate in front of him. I repeated the same with me but with smaller doses while Gary poured us some water. He was very sweet.